Photo by James Lockridge/Big Heavy World.

A group of local community builders joined guest host Jim Lockridge as panelists on ‘Rocket Shop‘, Big Heavy World’s weekly local Vermont music radio hour on 105.9FM The Radiator. The conversation brought to light the issues and opportunities that our music community face in Vermont — from a need for overtness in creating ‘safe’ spaces to collaboration and fearlessness in introducing each other to new sounds and subcultures. It highlighted our strengths, too, and is a short deep dive into our status and future as a music community. Big Heavy sends big thanks out to each panelists for lending their time and experience to a pubic conversation that has already strengthened our scene.

Melo Grant is a community radio enthusiast known for her long running radio show, The Cultural Bunker, heard on WRUV 90.1 FM and now also on WBTV LP 99.3 FM. She offers a platform to independent VT based musicians which allows them the opportunity to expose their music to a wider audience.

Brian LaClair fronts the Burlington-based band Better Things and programs The Hub, a teen center and skatepark serving at-risk youth of five towns in Addison County. He’s the founder of a local community run initiative to reinforce the safety and strengthen the relationship between the city’s many local underground presenters called DIY Burlington.

Meredith Davey is a local music promoter, an active participant of the Burlington music scene and the singer and vocalist in local rock trio, Gestalt.

Griffin Jones is a music community organizer with the Friends+Family booking collective which hosts DIY events, promotes new and emerging artists and fosters the local underground music scene. https://www.facebook.com/friendsandfamilyvt/